Manchester United: The good news about Olympiakos

It’s the big one. Even without the tutelage of David Moyes surely the Manchester United players will have enough adrenalin and pride pumping through their veins tonight to make a decent fist of this game.

It’s not like we are asking Manchester United to go to Barcelona and turn around a two goal deficit. This is Olympiakos at Old Trafford. And the good news is that the Greeks can be quite awful travellers.

They have lost every time that they have played in England. That’s eleven defeats in eleven outings. They have conceded an average of over 3 goals in each of those games and scored just three across all eleven fixtures.

Some have hinted at terrible luck this season but Manchester United were extremely fortunate to draw Olympiakos in this round, when virtually every other team was top notch or had a diamond encrusted history. Chelsea also had a favourable draw but not as good as this one.

It’s a simple equation. Manchester United must win comfortably against a team who would struggle in The Premier League. They have to start quickly and get that early goal. From then on they need to be absolutely relentless. Forget worrying about conceding. Because, in any other season, you would talking about Manchester United scoring 6 or 7 in this one. But, such has been the speed of decline, that even a narrow win isn’t guaranteed now.

Even if Manchester United do win comfortably tonight David Moyes shouldn’t feel safe in his job. But if Manchester United don’t qualify with the players that they have, then few could argue with the notion that it’s time for Moyes to depart.

1 COMMENT

The earlier Moyes depart, the better it will be. We have good players but they are not playing as a team. They lose position of ball any how and fail to attack from midfield. Moyes can not inculcate discipline into that team and that is the more reason he should leave because even if he sign another first 11 they will play the same way. Imagine our game against Liverpool, Rafael, Vidic and Jones, they lack discipline in that match.